JP2007312119A - Image processing apparatus, image processing method and image processing program - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an image processing apparatus, an image processing method and an image processing program, in which added information can be printed out on an area other than a document area and the information of a document can be printed out as it is. <P>SOLUTION: A print engine acting as the image processing apparatus recognizes a cutting prearranged area 44 which exists on the outside of a document area 40 on which document information is to be printed out and may be cut out after printing, and when a printing instruction of added information 45 to be printed out together with the document information exists, control for printing out the added information 45 on the recognized cutting prearranged area 44 is performed (step S203). <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus, an image processing method, and an image processing program for printing additional information such as date and page number.

  In an image processing apparatus such as a printing apparatus, it is desirable that information on a document to be printed is printed out according to the document. Therefore, extra information should not be added or edited at the time of printing for the manuscript area where manuscript information is printed.

  However, if the additional information such as date and page number is set to be printed, if the original area is close to the area of the recording medium such as paper used for printing, the additional information cannot be printed or the original area There is a problem that additional information is printed inside.

  Therefore, when printing additional information, there is a technique of performing a reduction process of the document area to provide a margin part around the document area and printing the additional information in the margin (see Patent Document 1).

However, the technique described in Patent Document 1 is not always satisfactory for the user because if the original area is reduced, the print output result as the original cannot be obtained.
JP-A-5-181943

  The present invention has been made in view of the above-described problems of the prior art, and an object of the present invention is to perform image processing capable of printing additional information outside the document area and printing the document information as the document. An apparatus, an image processing method, and an image processing program are provided.

  The above object of the present invention is achieved by the following means.

  (1) In the image processing apparatus, there is a recognition unit for recognizing a cutting area to be cut after printing outside a document area on which document information is printed, and a print instruction for additional information to be printed together with the document information. An image processing apparatus comprising: control means for performing control to print the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area.

  (2) The recognition unit recognizes the scheduled cutting area from information on a document area included in received PDL data and information on an area of a recording medium used for printing. An image processing apparatus according to 1.

  (3) The image processing apparatus according to (1) or (2), wherein the additional information includes at least one of a date, a page number, a serial number for each copy, and a font size.

  (4) In the image processing method, 1) a step of recognizing a cutting area to be cut after printing outside the original area where the original information is printed, and 2) printing of additional information to be printed together with the original information. And a step of controlling to print the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area when there is an instruction.

  (5) 1) Procedure for recognizing a cutting area to be cut after printing outside the original area where the original information is printed, and 2) When there is a print instruction for additional information to be printed together with the original information An image processing program for causing a computer to execute a procedure for performing control for printing the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area.

  (6) A computer-readable recording medium on which the image processing program according to (5) is recorded.

  According to the present invention, the additional information is always printed outside the document area, and is not printed inside the document area. For this reason, the information of the document is printed out as it is without being influenced by the size of the document.

  In addition, since additional information such as date and page number is printed around the document area, it is possible to efficiently handle and manage the printed output before cutting the recording medium using this additional information. It becomes.

  Embodiments according to the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

  FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the overall configuration of the network system according to the first embodiment of the present invention.

  The network system according to the present embodiment includes a PC 1 serving as a print instruction apparatus that instructs to print a document, and a print system 4 that performs printing based on a print instruction received from the PC 1. It is connected so that it can communicate. Note that the PC 1 and the printing system 4 may be directly connected (locally connected) between devices without going through the network 5.

  The printing system 4 includes a print controller 2 and a print engine 3 that are locally connected to each other. For this local connection, various local connection interfaces such as a serial interface such as USB and IEEE1394, a parallel interface such as SCSI and IEEE1284, and a wireless communication interface such as Bluetooth, IEEE802.11, HomeRF, and IrDA can be used.

  FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a configuration of the PC 1 shown in FIG. The PC 1 includes a CPU 11, a ROM 12, a RAM 13, a hard disk 14, a display 15, an input device 16 and a network interface 17, which are connected to each other via a bus 18 for exchanging signals.

  The CPU 11 performs control of each part and various arithmetic processes according to the program. The ROM 12 stores various programs and various data. The RAM 13 temporarily stores programs and data as a work area. The hard disk 14 stores various programs including an operating system and various data.

  Here, the hard disk 14 is installed with an application for creating a document file such as a PDF (Portable Document Format) file. Here, the PDF file is used as a kind of print data (PDL data) described in a page description language (PDL).

  The display 15 is an LCD, a CRT display, or the like, and is used for displaying various information. The input device 16 includes a pointing device such as a mouse and a keyboard, and is used for inputting various information.

  The network interface 17 is an interface for communicating with other devices via the network 5, and standards such as Ethernet (registered trademark), token ring, and FDDI are used.

  FIG. 3 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the print controller 2 in the printing system 4 shown in FIG. The print controller 2 includes a CPU 21, a ROM 22, a RAM 23, a hard disk 24, an input device 25, an engine interface 26, and a network interface 27, which are connected to each other via a bus 28 for exchanging signals. . Note that, among the above-described units of the print controller 2, portions having the same functions as those of the above-described units of the PC 1 are not described in order to avoid redundant description.

  Here, the ROM 22 or the hard disk 24 stores a processing program such as rasterizing processing for expanding the PDL data received from the PC 1 into a rasterized image that is bitmap format image data, and analysis of the received PDL data.

  The engine interface 26 is an interface for communicating with the locally connected print engine 3.

  FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the print engine 3 of the printing system 4 shown in FIG. The print engine 3 includes a CPU 31, a ROM 32, a RAM 33, a hard disk 34, an operation panel unit 35, a printing unit 36, and a controller interface 37, which are connected to each other via a bus 38 for exchanging signals. Yes.

  The ROM 32 stores a processing program such as a printing process for printing a rasterized image on paper.

  The operation panel unit 35 includes a touch panel, a numeric keypad, a start button, a stop button, and the like, and is used for displaying various information and inputting various instructions.

  The printing unit 36 prints various data on a recording material such as paper using a known image forming process such as an electrophotographic process. The controller interface 37 is an interface for communicating with the locally connected print controller 2.

  Note that the PC 1 and the printing system 4 may include components other than the components described above, or some of the components described above may not be included. For example, the printing system 4 may be provided with an image reading unit for reading a document or a GUI (Graphical User Interface).

  FIG. 5 is a diagram schematically illustrating an example of a print page handled in the present embodiment.

  As shown in FIG. 5, a scheduled cutting frame called a trim box 42 for setting a document area 40 inside the register mark 41 indicating the cutting position is set on the print page. In the print page, a recording medium frame called a media box 43 for setting an area of a recording medium such as paper is set. In the present embodiment, additional information 45 such as date and page number is printed in a cutting scheduled area 44 that is an area between the trim box 42 and the media box 43. Since the position of the document area frame is usually specified by the registration marks 41, the above-described cutting area 44 means an area outside the registration marks 41.

Examples of additional information 45 printed in the scheduled cutting area 44 are listed in the following (a) to (d). The printer often handles printed output before cutting, and the following information in the area outside the document area 40 is useful for efficient handling and management of the printed output.
(A) Date, to be exact print output date and time. With this information, it is possible to identify when the print job is output, and when a problem occurs in printing, it is possible to identify the point of occurrence of the problem.
(B) Page number. This information can be used, for example, for page leak checking of impositioned data.
(C) Serial number for each copy when multiple copies are printed. With this information, confidential documents can be managed.
(D) The font size of each of the additional information.

  The above is an example of the additional information 45 to be printed, and the types of additional information 45 to be handled are not limited to these. Further, which item of these items is printed as the additional information 45 can be arbitrarily selected by the user.

  In the present embodiment, in the print engine 3, information related to the print instruction of the additional information (management information) 45 such as the date, the page number, the serial number of each copy, and the font size is set in advance. In this case, the user's designation of the additional information item to be printed out of the multiple items is stored in the hard disk 34 of the print engine 3 together with the multiple items of additional information. However, the information regarding the print instruction of the additional information 45 can also be set in the print controller 2. Furthermore, in the PC 1, information related to the print instruction of the additional information 45 can be set and included in the print job.

  Next, the operation of the printing system in the present embodiment will be described.

  The printer driver of the PC 1 transmits a PDF file created using an application as a print job. At that time, the printer driver uses the “Trim Box” keyword for the print job to specify the size of the trim box 42 (scheduled cutting frame) for drawing the document area 40 inside the register mark 41 indicating the cutting position. In addition, the size of the media box 43 (recording medium frame) that defines the area of the recording medium is specified using the keyword “Media Box”.

  FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in the print controller 2 of the printing system 4 according to the first embodiment. The algorithm shown in the flowchart of FIG. 6 is stored as a program in a storage unit such as the ROM 22 and is executed by the CPU 21.

  As shown in FIG. 6, when receiving a print job, the print controller 2 temporarily stores it in the RAM 23 and analyzes the received PDF file, that is, starts symbol analysis from the top of the PDF file (step S101).

  Then, it is checked whether or not “Trim Box” and “Media Box” are detected in the symbol analysis (step S102). This corresponds to an operation of recognizing and extracting the scheduled cutting area 44 (additional information printing area) using “Trim Box” and “Media Box” as keywords.

  If “Trim Box” and “Media Box” are detected in the symbol analysis (YES in step S102), it is determined whether an additional information printing instruction is set for the print job (step S103). However, the additional information print instruction may be set ON / OFF in the print queue of the print controller 2.

  When the additional information printing instruction is set (YES in S103), the size values set in “Trim Box” and “Media Box” and the additional information printing instruction are transmitted to the print engine 3 (step S104). ).

  On the other hand, if “Trim Box” and “Media Box” are not detected in step S102 (NO in step S102), if it is determined in step S103 that no additional information printing instruction is set (in step S103). NO), the process proceeds to step S105.

  In step S <b> 105, the print job is rasterized and a rasterized image is transmitted to the print engine 3.

  FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in the print engine 3 of the printing system 4 according to the first embodiment. 7 is stored as a program in a storage unit such as the ROM 32, and is executed by the CPU 31.

  As shown in FIG. 7, when the print engine 3 receives the stabilized image from the print controller 2 (step S201), the print engine 3 determines whether or not the information of “Trim Box” and “Media Box” has been received (step S202). .

  When the print engine 3 has received the information of “Trim Box” and “Media Box” (YES in S202), the print engine 3 recognizes the scheduled cutting area 44 and also adds additional information set in advance by the print engine 3 The additional information 45 is added to the scheduled cutting area 44 according to the information about the print instruction 45 (step S203). Note that when the print engine 3 receives the information of “Trim Box” and “Media Box”, it has also received the additional information print instruction (see step S104).

  Here, additional information 45 is added (pasted) as image data to the scheduled cutting area 44 surrounded by the trim box 42 and the media box 43 in the received rasterized image. Thereby, the adjustment process of the printing position of the additional information 45 based on the trim box 42 and the media box 43 is performed.

  In step S204, the rasterized image is printed.

  On the other hand, when the information of “Trim Box” and “Media Box” has not been received (NO in S202), the print position adjustment process of the additional information 45 based on the trim box 42 and the media box 43 is not performed, and the print engine According to the information regarding the print instruction of the additional information 45 set to 3, the normal additional information 45 is printed (position adjustment of the additional information 45 to the cutting scheduled area 44 is not performed) (step S205). If there is no additional information printing instruction, the additional information printing process is not performed.

  After the printing, the printed output is cut along a trim box 42 (scheduled cutting frame) specified by the position of the register mark 41, and only the document area 40 is left. Before the cutting, additional information 45 such as date and page number is printed around the document area 40 on the printed output. Therefore, using this additional information 45, the printed output before cutting is printed. Can be managed easily. Further, after cutting according to the registration mark position 41, it can be handled as an official output.

  As described above, according to the present embodiment, the additional information is always printed outside the document area and is not printed inside the document area. For this reason, the information of the document is printed out as it is without being influenced by the size of the document. In addition, since additional information such as date and page number is printed around the document area, it is possible to efficiently handle and manage the printed output before cutting the recording medium using this additional information. It becomes.

  Furthermore, since the additional information is printed outside the document area, the output product after cutting can be used as the final product. Even when the document size is changed, the additional information can always be printed outside the document area.

  Next, a second embodiment of the present invention will be described. Hereinafter, description of points common to the first embodiment will be omitted as appropriate, and differences will be mainly described.

  In the second embodiment, the additional information 45 set by the print controller 2 is used. Therefore, in the print controller 2, information related to the print instruction of the additional information 45 such as date, page number, serial number of each copy, font size, etc. is set in advance. In this case, the user's designation of the additional information item to be printed out of the multiple items is stored in the hard disk 24 of the print controller 2 together with the multiple items of additional information.

  FIG. 8 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in the print controller 2 of the printing system 4 according to the second embodiment. Note that the algorithm shown in the flowchart of FIG. 8 is stored as a program in a storage unit such as the ROM 22, and is executed by the CPU 21.

  As shown in FIG. 8, when receiving a print job, the print controller 2 temporarily stores it in the RAM 23 and analyzes the received PDF file, that is, starts symbol analysis from the top of the PDF file (step S301).

  Then, through symbol analysis, it is determined whether an additional information print instruction is set for the print job (step S302).

  If it is determined that the print instruction for the additional information 45 has been set (YES in S302), it is checked whether or not “Trim Box” and “Media Box” have been detected (step S303).

  When “Trim Box” and “Media Box” are detected (YES in step S303), the print job is rasterized. Further, the additional information 45 is displayed in the scheduled cutting area 44 surrounded by the trim box 42 and the media box 43 of the rasterized image according to the information related to the print instruction of the additional information 45 set in advance by the print controller 2. It is added (pasted) as image data (step S304). Thereby, the adjustment process of the print position of the additional information 45 based on the trim box 42 and the media box 43 is performed.

  On the other hand, if it is determined in step S302 that the additional information printing instruction has not been set (NO in step S302), if “Trim Box” and “Media Box” are not detected in step S303 (in step S303). NO), the process proceeds to step S306.

  In step S306, the print job is rasterized. Further, the adjustment process of the print position of the additional information 45 based on the trim box 42 and the media box 43 is not performed, and the normal additional information 45 printing process is performed according to the information regarding the print instruction of the additional information 45 set in the print engine 3. (Rasterization) is performed (step S306). If there is no additional information printing instruction, the additional information printing process (rasterization) is not performed.

  In step S305, the rasterized image is transmitted to the print engine 3 (step S305).

  FIG. 9 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in the print engine 3 of the printing system 4 according to the second embodiment. The algorithm shown in the flowchart of FIG. 9 is stored as a program in a storage unit such as the ROM 32, and is executed by the CPU 31.

  As shown in FIG. 9, when the print engine 3 receives the rasterized image from the print controller 2 (step S401), the print engine 3 prints the received rasterized image (step S402).

  It goes without saying that the same effects as those of the first embodiment described above can also be obtained by the second embodiment.

  The present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiments, and various modifications can be made within the scope of the claims.

  In the above embodiment, a PDF file has been described as an example, but the present invention can also be applied to printing of a file having a format different from that of the PDF file.

  In the above embodiment, the print system 4 is divided into the print controller 2 and the print engine 3 and is locally connected to each other. However, the print controller 2 and the print engine 3 are integrated, for example, digital copying. It can also be configured. By applying the present invention even under such a configuration, the additional information 45 can be similarly printed in the scheduled cutting area 44.

  The means and method for performing various processes in the printing system according to the present embodiment can be realized by either a dedicated hardware circuit or a programmed computer. The program may be provided by a computer-readable recording medium such as a flexible disk or a CD-ROM, or may be provided online via a network such as the Internet. In this case, the program recorded on the computer-readable recording medium is usually transferred to and stored in a storage unit such as a hard disk. The program may be provided as a single application software, or may be incorporated into the software of the device as one function of the device.

1 is a block diagram showing an overall configuration of a network system according to a first embodiment of the present invention. It is a block diagram which shows the structure of PC shown by FIG. FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a print controller in the printing system illustrated in FIG. 1. FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a print engine of the printing system illustrated in FIG. 1. FIG. 3 is a diagram schematically illustrating an example of a print page handled in the present embodiment. 3 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in a print controller of the printing system according to the first embodiment. 3 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in a print engine of the printing system according to the first embodiment. 10 is a flowchart illustrating a processing procedure in a print controller of a printing system according to a second embodiment. It is a flowchart which shows the procedure of the process in the print engine of the printing system of 2nd Embodiment.

Explanation of symbols

1 PC,
11, 21, 31 CPU,
12, 22, 32 ROM,
13, 23, 33 RAM,
14, 24, 34 hard disk,
15 display,
16, 25 input devices,
17, 27 Network interface,
18, 28, 38 buses,
2 Print controller,
26 engine interface,
3 Print Engine 35 Operation Panel 36 Printing Department
37 Controller interface,
4 printing system,
5 network,
40 Document area 41 Register mark 42 Trim box 43 Media box 44 Cutting scheduled area 45 Additional information.

Claims (6)

In the image processing apparatus,
Recognizing means for recognizing a cutting scheduled area that is cut after printing outside the document area where the document information is printed;
Control means for performing control to print the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area when there is a print instruction of the additional information to be printed together with the document information;
An image processing apparatus comprising:   2. The image according to claim 1, wherein the recognition unit recognizes the scheduled cutting area from information on a document area included in the received PDL data and information on a recording medium area used for printing. Processing equipment.   The image processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the additional information includes at least one of a date, a page number, a serial number for each copy, and a font size. In the image processing method,
1) a step of recognizing an area to be cut that is to be cut after printing outside the original area where the original information is printed;
2) When there is an instruction to print additional information to be printed together with the original information, performing a control to print the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area;
An image processing method comprising: 1) A procedure for recognizing a cutting area to be cut after printing outside a document area on which document information is printed;
2) When there is a print instruction for additional information to be printed together with the original information, a procedure for performing control to print the additional information in the recognized cutting scheduled area;
An image processing program for causing a computer to execute.   A computer-readable recording medium on which the image processing program according to claim 5 is recorded.

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